


Homeward

by Tatooine92



Category: Pirates of the Caribbean (Movies)
Genre: Father-Daughter Relationship, Gen, Original Character(s), Originally Posted on Tumblr
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-02
Updated: 2017-08-18
Packaged: 2018-12-10 05:49:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 16,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11685357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tatooine92/pseuds/Tatooine92
Summary: Eleven years ago, Adonia Barbossa was abandoned as a child by her father for no discernible reason. Now a pirate captain in her own right, she seeks him to finally demand answers. (Set during At World's End.)





	1. The Captain at Port

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome, one and all, to the AO3 edition of Homeward, originally published on my Tumblr (tatooine92.tumblr.com). Glad you've joined me for this POTC OC AU romp. The thing that amused me the most about Dead Men Tell No Tales was Carina's identity, because I have been sitting on Adonia probably since 2009. I'm excited to finally share (part of) her story.

The sharp rap on the door of her cabin startled Adonia from a rest she hadn't realized she had taken. She jerked upright with a mumble, her auburn braid flipping over her shoulder as she tossed her head, and she pressed both palms into the table before her to steady herself as she regained consciousness. It took her a moment to remember she was aboard the _Dainty Lass_ , exactly where she was supposed to be, in her cabin. A lamp, almost out of oil, flickered across the table. Adonia shook the buzzing sleepiness out of the arm that had cradled her head and ran her hands across the maps and notes spread out before her. Before her lay charts of all the ports she had previously called home. Each one had been marked out with progressively angrier scribbles. Damn the East India Trading Company, interfering with a woman's perfectly respectable business ventures. Adonia rubbed her hands over her face and groaned. How was she supposed to keep her crew fed and ship afloat if she was running out of ports to sell in? 

The knock on her door repeated, more urgently. Adonia grumbled "coming, coming" as she swung out of her chair, snatching her compass off the table and her hat off the luxurious sleeping accommodations known as "a cot in a corner." Tugging the wide brim of her hat down over her brow, she flung open the doors to her cabin. Before her was her first mate, a slender but well-muscled seaman called Jim who was as steady as a ship in dry dock and had no intentions of ever wearing any name _but_ Jim (he liked the simplicity). Jim's dark skin bore a sheen of sweat and was flecked with salt from the sea spray. 

"Comin' up on Tortuga, _mon_ _capitaine_ ," he said in his Haitian accent when Adonia appeared. 

Adonia sighed as she exited her cabin with Jim. "One of these days I'll be needin' an explanation from the East India Trading Company—" She spat the name. "—as to why they took over every port _except_ the one I can't abide." 

"They did it just to make you mad in particular," Jim noted, so smoothly sarcastic you'd almost think he was serious. 

Adonia smirked at her first mate as she headed for the wheel of the _Lass_ , her shoulders squared and boots thudding across the deck with the rhythm of a woman on a mission. As had always been her pirating custom, she raided merchant ships, leaving them disabled and relieved of their wealth but otherwise unharmed. The result, of course, was her holds filled to bursting with sugar, rum, silk—name it, and she probably had it. In the past, she had styled herself as a _legitimate businesswoman_ , masquerading as a merchant vessel and sailing into various ports, particularly English settlements, to sell her fine luxuries at a rather considerable profit. These days, with every port closing as the EITC closed its fist around the seas, the facade of legitimacy fell aside, and she was forced to sell what goods she had left almost at a loss to pirates as desperate as she feared her crew might become.  

Besides, she just didn't _like_ Tortuga. The air reeked of bad rum, vomit, and piss, and a few other bodily substances she'd rather not ponder. It always seemed to be in a state of constant rioting and upheaval (more or less literal, considering the vomit). She was a pirate, aye, but she'd always considered herself a _lady_ pirate. "Princess of the seas," she'd been called as a child. Like as not to be a queen someday. 

Currently, though, it looked more like "not." She stepped back from the wheel, and Jim set his hand to it as she turned toward the deck rail, withdrawing her compass from the pocket of her dark blue justacorps. Both compass and sundial, it was as big as her palm and set in gold engraved with leaves and little birds. It was a fine piece—expensive. Whoever had owned it before her father had stolen it and called it his must have lived a life that Adonia could only dream of, with a fine house and plentiful food and all the comforts of being a person of quality. 

She sighed as she flipped the compass in her palms and rubbed her thumbs over the _H.B._ engraved on the back in letters almost as wide as the compass itself. When she was inclined to unveil her personal life, she'd say her father only ever gave her two things: her life and a stolen compass. Some father. What kind of man raised her on his ship for six years and then tossed her off at port for no reason with naught but the clothes on her back and that compass? What cruelty could possibly... possibly... 

Adonia's throat choked, and she shoved the compass back into her pocket. It'd been eleven years since he'd dumped her off. Here she was now, a woman grown at seventeen, captain of her own ship, still alive and all. _Princess of the seas of my own making, no thanks to you,_ _Papa._ Yet the bitter tang of her thoughts sat ill with her. There had to be a reason. Papa always had a reason. Though maybe cruelty was reason enough. 

Jim called to her, and she turned back, straightening her shoulders and blinking back the tears that had burned her eyes. The _Dainty Lass_ sailed smoothly into port, her crew rushing to bring in sails and lower anchors. Adonia smiled to herself with a surge of pride. They were good men, each one. It'd been a rocky start, inheriting the _Lass_ from her now-retired captain and trying to convince the crew to sail under a woman, but she'd tried and succeeded. Maybe that was a third thing her father had given her: tooth-and-nail tenacity and a spiteful streak to boot. 

"We need to offload this haul," she told Jim as the _Lass_ came to rest at anchor. "We sell the loot, then the men can have the night to themselves. We daren't to stay, though, not with the likes of Beckett haunting the tides." 

She saw Jim shudder at the mention of Cutler Beckett. In truth, there was not a pirate alive who didn't feel a chill in his bones at the thought of that unreasonably influential and impossibly cruel man. It was a terrible amount of vileness packed into such a short figure. 

"We may be safer here then, _cap_ _i_ _tai_ _n_ _e_ ," Jim told her. "He is not like to come here." 

"Yet." Adonia sharply closed the word with a hard _T_.  

Jim frowned, but she knew him well enough to know he both believed her and agreed. Safe quarters were few and far between these days. Adonia elected not to think on it, though, as she descended from the wheel. Jim followed her, barking orders to the crew to haul up their cargo for sale. Adonia checked through her inventory manifests—perhaps too detailed for a pirate, but she believed in being honest in her dishonesty—as the men carried the goods ashore. Not near enough to survive much longer, she knew. Even the stores of coin she'd set aside in years of plenty were beginning to diminish. Something had to give—Beckett and his Company, or her. 

She left the trading and bartering to Jim and Thom, the _Lass_ 's boatswain, as she headed farther into port to pick up news, gossip, and any assorted mail that had found its way to Tortuga for her. The port was somewhat quieter than usual, but there were still hours left to sundown, when all sundry debaucheries emerged in full, uh, glory. Adonia headed to her favorite tavern, a side-alley establishment called the Cat and Crow, where rum was plentiful for her men and wine was plentiful for her. This particular tavern was less seedy than the rest of Tortuga—a rare find indeed—though it still offered all the usual vices and temptations, though none for her. It also served as the closest thing she had to a permanent address, as the proprietor was her former captain's nephew's son-in-law or some such. Never mind. It meant he liked the crew of the _Dainty Lass_ , and it was enough for Adonia. 

The Cat and Crow was quiet enough when Adonia entered. Pirates getting an early start on their drinking were clustered throughout, but the noise was only low, mumbled conversation peppered with the occasional guffaw or clank of tankards smashing in a toast. Far to the back, near the stairs, a man and woman were enjoying themselves a little too publicly; even though the woman's skirts covered everything, it was not hard to divine their activities. Adonia rolled her eyes as she crossed to the bar, where the owner was pouring water into one of the rum bottles. 

"Ye'd best have a good strong red for me today, Avery," Adonia called as she approached. 

Avery, a stocky man with a scraggly beard and an impish grin, grabbed a bottle from under the counter as he turned. 

"If it isn't me favorite Cap'n Barbossa," he said, setting the wine bottle and a tankard on the bar. Adonia leaned against it to pop the cork and pour herself a drink, all a-smirk. 

"I'm the only one you've met," she said. 

"Aye, but ye hear stories. Hence why you're me favorite." 

"Oh, and what stories d'ye have for me today?" Adonia took a swig from her wine. Better to get to the gossip than ponder her father, much as something deep in her stung and wanted to ask _please, please, have you heard anything from him, I heard a rumor he was_ _dead._  

Avery clicked his tongue and leaned conspiratorially toward her. Adonia raised a brow under her hat. 

"I heard," he said, "that those louts with the Ee-Eye-Tee-See have gone and unleashed an unholy terror on the seas. It's an enemy that crawled up from the depths and fears nothin' and leaves nary a survivor in its wake. You don't see it comin'. You just turn 'round and there's its guns, sendin' you to meet your maker." 

Adonia looked at Avery over the edge of her mug as if he'd lost his grip on every last sense. She was more than familiar with sailors' horror stories, but she fancied herself too worldly-wise for them. 

"Avery," she said, voice low, "ye best not be havin' me on." 

"Hand to Baby Jaysus, I am not." 

"Does anybody know what or who this enemy _is,_ then?" 

"They say it's th' _Flying Dutchman_. Davy Jones an' all." 

Adonia's wine burned more than usual in the back of her throat at the sound of the name. She set down her mug and stared at Avery, eyes wide in the shadow of her hat brim. She knew the stories. You didn't live your whole life on ships without the distinct pleasure of one seaman's legend after another. So of _course_ she knew the spine-freezing legends of Davy Jones. This fit, too, with hearing that the _Flying Dutchman_ had been seen more and more frequently in recent days. Oh, God. If the Company had somehow managed to press Jones into its service, no pirate left at sea stood a chance. 

But Captain Adonia Barbossa was not one to stay at home with her knitting when there was a fight to be had. 

She knocked back another swig of wine, her mind racing. The most obvious answer was to run. Abruptly give up pirating, get to Shipwreck, and stay there, never to see the sea again. Well, that sat ill with her. "Ye were born with a line in your hand," her father used to tell her; she had permanent sea legs and saltwater for blood. Abandoning the sea was not an option. Neither was dying upon it. That left either fighting—one brig against the whole Company armada, unlikely!—or surviving to fight another day. Adonia knew herself. If she was anything, she was a scrapper and a strategist—a _survivor_. She had not come this far to be cowed by stories of ghost ships. Her blood was salt and steel and fury, and she did not fear death. 

"Cap'n!" Avery called to her when she clearly drifted into her own thoughts. Adonia's sharp blue eyes snapped to him. 

"Aye." She got to her feet and plunked down enough silver to cover her drink. "Thanks for the news. Anything else?" 

"Aye, a bit." Avery glanced about and cleared his throat before lowering his voice. "The elder Cap'n Barbossa's been spotted up in Cuba. Wouldn't surprise me at all if he were like to come here next." 

Adonia's stomach dropped as if she'd just misstepped off a cliff. She sagged back down against the bar, perched on a stool this time. _Papa's alive. Papa's alive, and he's close._  

"How do you know this?" she whispered. Her heart pounded so loudly in her ears that she almost couldn't hear Avery's reply. 

"Not exactly as if his ship's subtle," Avery said with a snort. "Nor's it as if he's not a feared name in these waters." 

"Feared?" 

Avery shrugged. "Eh, feared, respected, same difference." 

_No, it's really not_ , Adonia thought. She swallowed hard. "Is that all you know?" 

"Aye, but I'll keep ears out for more." 

"Do," Adonia said, and she got up. 

As she headed for the door, she felt maybe she shouldn't have gotten up in the first place. Her heartbeat echoed in her head, and she suddenly felt like she was trapped between two walls rapidly closing together. _Papa's alive._ Once again, she was a terrified six-year-old girl standing alone on a dock, watching the black sails of her father's ship be swallowed up by the horizon's flickering line. She dragged her compass out of her pocket and clutched it tight, her fist shaking as it wrapped around the piece.  

_How could you leave_ _me,_ _Papa? You said I was your sea princess, you said... you said..._  

Quick as she could, Adonia rushed back toward the docks and the _Lass_. She dodged a man puking into a gutter, though just barely, as her eyes blurred with sudden tears. She raced out to the shore and, for a split second of wild fury and pain, nearly hurled the compass to the depths. But she couldn't open her fist to cast it out, and Adonia crumpled onto the damp sand, pulling her knees into her chest, as the tide rolled out, and in, and out, and kissed the toes of her boots each time it came back in. 

She couldn't decide if this was good news or horrible news. Would her father even know her if he saw her again? Would he even _care_ to see her? The man who raised his daughter on his ship from infancy only to dump her, alone and destitute, surely couldn't be bothered to know her or want her now. But a deep, aching part of Adonia hungered for that reunion. She wanted to run to him and fling her arms around him, pressing herself into his side in a full-body embrace, the way she used to. She wanted to be greeted warmly with his staccato laugh and sea-strong arms hefting her up and holding her close. Suddenly she missed the smell of sea salt and apple peels that clung to him like perfume, and she missed the tickle of his beard against her forehead as he kissed her hair. Adonia clutched the compass to her chest and buried her face against her knees, sobbing softly. _Papa_. 


	2. The Captain at the Helm

Adonia sat on the beach until sundown, her chin on her arms as the sun sank into the rippling waves. Behind her, Tortuga got progressively louder and bawdier the darker the sky became. The lights on the _Lass_ slowly glowed to life, and she knew at least one crewman was aboard. She got to her feet and dusted the wet sand off her breeches, returning the compass to her pocket and wiping the tear-salt from her cheeks. Some captain she was, sitting on a beach in tears when there was work to be about.

She headed back for the _Lass_ , lost in thought. So Beckett and his ilk had somehow jumped in bed with a full-on sea legend. Or maybe it was the other way around. Either way, it did not bode well for anyone who wished to sail the sea as he pleased. All Adonia wanted to do was live her life. She wasn't actively hurting anyone, but oh, she'd heard the panicked whispers on the winds. Beckett had taken to killing anyone even remotely associated with piracy. It was a miracle she'd dodged his "justice" as long as she had. Helped that she was banned from Port Royal, she figured. But what to do, what to do? Eventually she would run out of places to run, but if she stood alone to fight, she'd lose everything.

How could she figure all this out without panicking or acting too swiftly? For all she knew, these were just bad rumors, but her gut said no. Her gut was rarely wrong and oh, God, she hated that about herself sometimes. Besides, sightings of the _Flying Dutchman_ had been more plentiful in recent weeks, and she knew Beckett's boundless malice was legitimate. It might be wise to collect hard proof, but she had a terrible sense of not having time for that. 

Adonia returned to a quiet and empty _Lass_. The men had taken their leave for the evening, off to waste their gold on what Adonia had come to call "tits and tipple." The company of her ship better suited her anyway, and once she was aboard, she made her way to the wheel, leaning against it with a sigh. Her hands swept tenderly down the wheel, its wood rubbed smooth by years of human touch. The handles seemed almost to melt into her hand as she curved her fingers around one of them. Adonia gazed down the length of her speedy little brig, leaning so to rest her chin on the wheel. _Think_ _, Addie, think._ _Cap'n_ _Barnes didn't bequeath you this ship for you to lose it to the likes of_ _Beckett_ _._

_No_ , she corrected herself. _I earned this ship. He gave me a shot, but I've earned it._ _I am my father's daughter after all, whether he knows it or not._

And she was not like to surrender all she'd won out of fear. But then, neither was she like to endanger her crew for the sake of her pride. Aye, she'd fight to the death for her own honor, but she would not throw other men's lives away like that. They'd signed on to sail under her, not die for her, though Adonia knew a few probably would volunteer. She didn't want to get to that point. 

The thud of familiar footsteps made her look up to see Jim approaching her. He gave her an easy smile in the blue-black of evening, stopping near the wheel and looking out across the harbor, hands on his hips.

"Turned a pretty penny, _capitaine_ ," he told her. "Crew's happy. Where to next?"

"...I don't know," Adonia sighed. Jim dropped his hands and studied her with an arched brow.

"You don't not know. I know how you think, and it is not like that. _Qu'est-ce_ _qui se_ _passe_?"

Addie sighed a second time and relayed the news about Beckett and Davy Jones. Both of Jim's eyebrows arched at that, and he exhaled heavily, running a hand across his shorn scalp.

"Foul winds, captain," he grumbled. "I don't like it."

"Neither do I, and there's a more interesting bit too." She took a slow breath. "My father's been sighted in Cuba."

"Oh, _non, mon_ _capitaine_ ," Jim immediately said, recoiling and shaking his head. "That be a _bad_ idea. Find the _Black Pearl_ , see your father, what for? More grief? You can't possibly—"

Adonia had turned her gaze out to sea. In the distance, a dolphin leaped into the air and splashed back down with a happy, chittering gurgle. Jim groaned.

"You want to find him."

Adonia turned back to Jim, brows furrowed. "Aye, of course I do. This is the single thing I haven't had in all me years at sea, and now I've a chance to demand _why_."

"And you an' I both know bad things happen when you go askin' too many questions."

"Bad things also happen when I don't ask nearly enough," she said with a smirk.

"Aye, which is how we got banned from Port Royal three years ago."

"It is not!"

"Is too, and you know so. Just because you didn't check the goods..."

"Well, now, let's not drag up bygones," Adonia sniffed, lightly tossing her hair.

Jim just rolled his eyes and shook his head. Adonia smirked because she knew he wouldn't fight her past this point. He would argue with her all day, but at the end of it, Jim was the sort of sailor who followed his captain to hell or beyond—even if sometimes he had to drag her by her collar out of whatever foolery she'd gotten knee-deep in. With Jim, there was the sense that everything tested the limits of his tolerance, but nothing Adonia had done had broken those limits yet.

This, however, might come dangerously close. Jim's slim, athletic frame was tense, a whole-body reaction opposed to pursuing the _Black Pearl_. Adonia was sorry to make him feel that way. In a way, she felt she was using him and, by extension, the whole crew. Was this really such a bad idea? It seemed fair that after so many years alone she should finally get answers, but not at the cost of her crew's trust. Jim met her gaze and rolled his shoulders back.

"So, when do we go after _ton_ _père_?" Jim asked.

"We can wait 'til the morn," Adonia said. She reached over and laid her hand on his shoulder. " _S'il_ _tu_ _pla_ _ît_ , Jim. Please. _C'est_ _dans_ _le_ _besoin_ _qu'on_ _reconnaît_ _ses_ _vrais_ _amis_ _._ "

"I'm your friend always, not just when you need things," Jim sighed. "And your French is still terrible."

"You'll just have to teach me some more, aye?"

"Stick to Spanish," Jim said as he left the wheel for the main deck to begin his first watch. "You're better at it."

"That was _highly_ uncalled for!" Adonia yelled after him. Jim laughed loudly in return.

Adonia leaned on the wheel with a sigh as Jim left.  

"What d'ye think, _Lass_?" she breathed to the ship. "Am I makin' a huge mistake?"

The ship didn't answer, of course, but Adonia listened just the same. You'd think a child abandoned by her father would want to go the opposite direction of him. If he was in Cuba, maybe she should be somewhere even farther away, like Barbados or, hell, the Far East. But no. Adonia had grown up with her father for six years, day in and day out, watching him be a clever first mate (if a hard taskmaster) and watching him lead the mutiny against Sparrow. She knew, at least in part, how his mind worked. She _knew_ he did nothing without a reason. But then, she'd been over this again and again in her own head. Maybe she was wrong and reason had nothing to do with it. Or maybe they were terrible, vile reasons, like greed and hate and malice. Maybe she didn't know her father as well as she'd thought and she had never been as precocious and bright a child as she'd assumed.    


Self-doubt clawed at her the way a drowning man clawed at his own throat. Thanks to her observation skills she had honed over the years, she wasn't often wrong, but what if she was this time? The little girl crying inside her begged her at least to try, and Adonia knew a hungry heart like hers wouldn't take anything else. She sighed and slipped away from the wheel, leaning back over the rail to gaze outward, her back to the port.    


There was music in the way the _Lass_ 's hull creaked as she bobbed at anchor, the way the gathered sails whispered for freedom and the lines grumbled with impatience. This ship, with its sleek lines and elegant rigging, was the steadiest home Adonia had ever had. Six years with Papa, eight with various crews and captains, the rest on her own—her whole life had been on the move. That part didn't bother her. With the _Lass_ , she took her home wherever she might wander. What bothered her was a restless churning in her spirit, the way the sea whipped itself into foam when a storm loomed. Suddenly home seemed to abstract, as if it was something _out there_ rather than here aboard the _Lass_. What did she _want_?

The tide gurgled against the hull. Not too far off, seagulls screeched to each other as they bedded down for the night. The _Lass_ 's lanterns glowed softly against the deck and, farther below, the shabby, rotting boards of the dock. Uproarious laughter and howls echoed from the evening's _festivities_ ashore. Somebody fired a pistol, then another, then another. Adonia sighed and slipped down to the quarterdeck and toward her cabin.

" _Beaux_ _r_ _êves_ ," Jim called to her from his post closer to the stern. "Men'll be ready to sail tomorrow."

"Good," Adonia replied. "Anyone not sober enough to sail gets left behind. I'll not be slowin' this vessel on account of headaches."

She retired to her cabin and locked the door, tossing her hat onto her desk and shrugging off her coat. She pulled her compass out of the coat's pocket before tossing the coat onto the nearest chair, and she flopped down onto her cot, turning the compass over in her hands. _I'll find you, Papa._ _Maybe then you'll tell me_ _why._ At least she could count on this compass always pointing north, for north was the way she was bound.


	3. A Memory: The Captain Discarded

_Eleven years ago, age 6._

A long time ago, Adonia had learned that part of being a very good girl was to stay aboard in Papa's cabin whenever the crew went ashore somewhere. Well, it was Papa's cabin now anyway. They had got rid of Captain Jack somehow and picked up all kinds of treasure, though when Adonia looked at all the gold coins, they gave her a funny feeling in her stomach. Looking at them, the world seemed strange, like the way everything got all blurry if she crossed her eyes a little.

"Papa," she said one night as they sat together in his cabin. She was pressed into his side, tucked under his arm, while he read to her--one of Aesop's little stories from a great big book of them. "Papa, is the treasure sick?"

"Sick?" Her father lowered the book to his lap. "What kind of a question be that?"

Adonia shrugged and pressed her head to his chest the way a kitten rubs against an offered hand. 

"Just feels funny when I look at it."

Her father clicked his tongue and smoothed her hair.

"I'll not have any blood of mine afeared of gold," he said. "Ye've listened too close to ghost stories, me Addie. Best to put it out of mind. 'Tis only a story, and not a good one."

It most certainly wasn't a story Adonia liked much. And she _especially_ didn't like the scary feeling that slowly crept over the ship, like a vine tearing into a brick building. She didn't like seeing the crew get meaner to each other, and she had to stay in Papa's cabin more often. Sometimes, late at night, she could hear fighting, and then she'd hear Papa get up with a grumble and stomp outside and, in his great big thunderclap voice, spew invective at the offending sailors. Then he'd come back inside and mutter and curse when he thought she was still asleep, and Adonia would shiver under her blankets as the climbing vine feeling got worse.

Then one day they sailed into Tortuga. Adonia didn't like it there. It was loud and smelled bad and people were mean. This time, Papa made her stay in the cabin even before they dropped anchor. He didn't talk to her sweetly or promise to bring her trinkets like he usually did. There was a coldness to him that frightened her—a terrible gleam in his eyes that gave her the sense of a hungry jaguar prowling through a jungle. She stayed in the cabin like a very good girl, reading her books and playing with her little sailors and boats.

Hours passed while she was by herself. She didn't hear anything outside, but she knew to stay put. Papa always came for her when it was safe. She knew it was because the crew would go get drunk and do things that were not good for little girls to see. But it would be fine. Papa would always make it safe for her. He was a good man. He would keep her safe.

But she was worried. Through the windows of the cabin she could see the sun going down. Papa had never been gone so long. But he'd come back; he always did. Adonia didn't know what else to do but wait, and when it came time for bed, she crawled under her blankets with her toy sailors clutched tight and tried to sleep. It was hard to sleep without Papa's pet monkey chittering across the room or without Papa's occasional deep sighs while he dozed. It was hard to sleep without being able to leave her cot and climb into his bed and press her little body entirely into the warmth of his side, under his arm. She whispered "Good night, me Addie" to herself, but she didn't sound like him and it didn't make her any less scared or alone.

She must have fallen asleep at some point, though, because she woke up with a flash of sunlight streaming in through the window and the sounds of the crew outside. She quickly scrambled out of bed just as the cabin doors flew open, and there was Papa. Of course he'd come back, he always did! Adonia threw down her toys and raced to him, flinging her arms around his waist. He didn't hug back like he normally did, but he did softly stroke his fingers down her hair. 

"Time for ye to go ashore, Adonia," he said. There was grit and gravel in his voice that made him sound not at all like Papa.

Adonia craned her head up to him, confused. She didn't know what to ask or say as her father scooped her onto his hip. She looped her arms around his neck and kept staring at him.

"Ashore? You don't let me, Papa, it's too scary for me."

"True though that be, it's best for ye to make your way, lass."

His words sent terror spiking through her like a sudden chill. She clung even tighter to his coat and his shoulders. Make her own way? What did that mean? Did she not get to stay on the _Black Pearl_ anymore? Why? What had she done? Her heart pounded as her father carried her out of the cabin and down the gangway.

"Papa, no, I don't want to go," she begged him. "Whatever I did to make you mad, Papa, I'm sorry, I won't do it again, please don't make me go, I don't want to go!"

Her heart beat so hard she thought it might burst. She dug her fingers into her father's coat and began to tremble. They reached the dock, and he tried to set her down. Adonia screamed. She wrapped her legs around his waist and held on so tightly that every muscle hurt.

"I don't want to go!" she sobbed. "Papa, please, I'm sorry, please don't make me go!"

"Hush, girl!" he barked at her. The sharpness of his tone startled her into silence, though she still trembled and tears welled.

With her shocked silence, he was able to peel her off him and set her down on the dock. He gripped her shoulders tight enough that it almost hurt. Adonia looked at him, head spinning. What had she even done wrong? Was it because she'd said she was scared of the treasure? That was the only thing remotely bad she could think of. She'd always tried so hard to be very, very good. She was a good little sailor and a good little girl. What had she done?

"There's no place for ye aboard this ship," her father told her in a braced voice. His eyes were bloodshot. He looked pale and sick. "So you're to make your own way."

Adonia shook her head furiously.

"Papa—no—"

He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out his compass, shoving it into her palms.

"Find your way home," he told her.

"But I am home!" Adonia sobbed.

Her father said nothing else as he got up and turned on heel to stride back aboard. Adonia ran after him quick as she could, but the crew was already pulling in the gangway. No, no, this couldn't be happening, he couldn't be leaving her, why would he do that, Papa loved her, Papa always made it safe for her, what had she done...

"Papa!" she screamed, panic clutching her chest as hard as she clutched the compass. His back was to her. She couldn't tell if he heard her. She screamed louder. " _Papa!_ "

The crew weighed anchor and dropped canvas, and with a horrified shriek Adonia watched the _Black Pearl_ , the only home she'd ever known, turn for open sea. Her breathing short, Adonia looked down into the harbor. If she jumped, she could swim out, climb back aboard... maybe Papa would tell her what she'd done wrong and she could make it better... She tried to shove the compass into her pocket (wouldn't fit) and took a deep breath, jumping off the dock and into the water. She immediately began to paddle for the _Pearl_.

"Papa! _Papa!_ Come back! Come back for your Addie!"

The water was deeper than she'd expected, and the _Pearl_ was big and fast. Horror chilled her. She'd never catch up. Sobbing, she floated back to the pier and clutched one of the supports as the tide sloshed against her. She sobbed until she couldn't breathe, face streaked with tears and splashed with seawater. She watched, helpless, as the _Pearl_ grew tinier and tinier and then disappeared from view.

"I only ever tried to be good," she gasped.

Her only answer was a screeching gull careening overhead.


	4. The Captain at War

_Present day._

Adonia stepped out of her cabin with the sun's rising, twisting her auburn hair into a thick braid. Tortuga had grown quiet as its population of carousing scallywags slept the day away, though a few people had begun to mill about. For her, it felt later than it already was. She had already been up for hours, plotting their course and mapping their heading. Soon, soon they would be underway. Thom had already come back from _socializing_ and was climbing the lines, inspecting them and hard at work at his bosun duties. He whistled as he climbed; not a man for words most days, that one, but he did love a good song. Adonia had never been raised to sing aboard a ship, but she figured Thom could do what he liked as long as he got his work done.

Footsteps on the ladder up from the lower decks made Adonia turn in time to see Jim emerge. He gave her a nod and an easy smirk as he stretched in the sunlight.

"Men are stirrin', _mon_ _capitaine_ ," he told her. "We'll be ready to cast off soon."

"Good. I'm more'n ready to be away from this pestilent cesspit."

"And how d'you _really_ feel about it, eh?"

Adonia arched an eyebrow at him and turned for the hatch leading belowdecks. She could hear the men moving about, but she whistled sharply.

"On deck, you pack of insolent wastrels!" she yelled at them. "We were to be away an hour ago!"

Immediately, her crew stepped to, scrabbling up onto the main deck and to work. Jim quirked a brow at his captain, amused.

"An hour ago?" he said. 

Adonia just smirked and said nothing, turning to go up to the wheel and pulling her hat down low over her brow to shade her face. Jim faced the men and paced the deck, calling orders for castoff. Before much longer they were underway, and Adonia hummed a tavern tune under her breath as she turned the massive wheel and guided her _Lass_ out to open sea. She couldn't help the broadening smile on her lips as the sails filled with wind and the keel sliced through the waves, seafoam hissing up the side of the hull like steam. Like any captain worth his salt, she knew her heading and set her course for Cuba. Ship and captain moved together as if the rudder chain joined their souls, as if the seawater splashed along the hull and, in doing so, splashed into Adonia's veins. Days like this, maybe she hadn't been born with a line in her hand so much as the ship's wheel itself.

The thought raised an interesting question, though. Would she even be here, boots solidly planted on the deck, undaunted by the crest and fall of the waves, if her father hadn't abandoned her? She couldn't honestly tell herself it was worth it, not right now. Would she have been happier aboard the _Pearl_ with him than on the _Lass_? Was the courage and ambition she had developed worth the clawing, lonely silence at night? She glanced down at her compass to check the heading even though she didn't need to, cupping her hand around the engraved gold. When she closed her eyes, the metal almost felt warm with her father's body heat it had absorbed in his pocket before he pressed it into her tiny, shaking hands. But she knew that wasn't so.

Adonia opened her eyes and looked out across the sea. The wind grabbed her braid and tugged like a child holding his mother's hand. _I'm a fool,_ she thought, _hauling my crew across the tides for my own resolution_. But she would not turn back, not this time. This time, she wasn't jumping off a dock into open sea. She had a ship. She could catch the _Pearl_.

* * *

Around twelve hours later, maybe an hour or so out from sundown, Jim yelled to her to announce land in sight. There lay Cuba, and Adonia's brows furrowed. Cuba was a large island with a lot of open water. She'd known that, of course, but it suddenly dawned on her that she had not bothered to ask Avery _where_ in Cuba her father had been seen. _Damn it._ That scared and lost little girl living in her psyche had got the better of her. _Shit._

To all outside eyes, nothing was wrong. Adonia twisted her lips as she adjusted course to sail northward along the coast to Havana. But Jim knew. He came up to the wheel and saw her lips pursed and her shoulders tensed. She didn't look at him, save the briefest glance from the corner of her eye, as Jim waited in silent question.

"We're not like to make Havana by nightfall," she said. "Best find a place to drop anchor somewhere along the coast."

"He's in Havana?" Jim murmured within only her earshot. Adonia let out a slow, tense exhale.

"I have no earthly idea. Keep a lookout, aye? It's a black galleon with black sails. Won't be hard to spot."

" _C'est_ _ça_ , but this is a big ocean."

"...and I suppose he could've already come and gone."

_Or was never here._ Uncertainty froze in her gut as the _Lass_ continued more northerly. Her mind raced, and everything she looked at seemed sharper, clearer somehow. Aye, Avery had only said _Cuba_. He hadn't specified where. Maybe he hadn't received that information himself. Or maybe he'd withheld it. But why would Avery keep that from her? It didn't make sense. What could he possibly hope to gain by sending her up here with no real leads—by preying on her need for answers? Unless—

"Cap'n!" Thom, her bosun, yelled up to her from the main deck in his heavy brogue. "Ship approachin', starboard aft!"

Adonia whirled. For a split second her eyes widened with the hope of seeing black sails and her father's skull-and-crossbones flag, but no—white sails and—oh God. When she saw the colors of the East India Trading Company floating on the wind, her gut dropped into her boots. She'd almost prefer the Royal Navy. At least they'd be polite about her hanging.

"Company ship!" she yelled. She threw her whole body into a sharp spin of the wheel to head more northeast, away from the coast and out to open ocean. "All hands to battle stations, guns at the ready! Step to, you verminous inbreds—we'll not be dyin' today!"

Her crew leaped to action, scrambling for the guns as Jim and Thom barked orders to them. Adonia spun back for a quick look at the pursuing ship, eyes scanning it. Ship of the line. Big, heavy, slow. They'd outrun it. Didn't have to run far, just beyond the reach of its guns. But her swift little brig, lightened from its last cargo haul, would make it. She had to. She wouldn't be—

The crack of cannonfire, rumbling like a distant thunderclap, put ice and fire both in her blood.

"God dammit, Jim, load the stern chasers, return fire!" she screamed down. "Buy us time!"

Jim yelled back either assent or complaint in such stressed, rapid-fire French that Adonia had no idea what he said and frankly didn't care. All she knew was he'd shifted a couple sailors back to the chase guns to try to keep the Company vessel at bay.

Too slow, though. A split second after Adonia ordered fire returned, the shot from the other vessel careened through the air over her head. She recognized it by its end-over-end spiraling. Chain shot. With a dull _thunk_ and a sharp crack, the chain wrapped around the mainmast, the balls at either end of the chain clanking together. The mast didn't crack entirely, but it listed slightly, making her throat turn to cotton.

"Brace the mast!" Thom yelled below her, rushing forward with hastily collected equipment. "We'll not let this lassie down!"

He was scrabbling up the ratlines to reach the damage when a second cannon shot shattered the air. Adonia sucked in a sharp breath as she muscled the wheel back to port, trying to dodge it. But her spirited and spritely _Lass_ was not _that_ quick on her feet. The second chain shot collided with the mainmast, and this time the crack was much deeper and more sickening.

"Mother of God," Adonia breathed as the mast wobbled. Then the split in the wood widened, cracking like a felled tree. "Thom, get down, get down, damn ya, she's comin' down!"

Thom leaped down from the ratlines right as the mast split. Adonia's eyes widened and her grip froze on the wheel as the mast toppled, lines splitting and sails fluttering like the feathers of a bird spiraling into the ground. Sailors leaped out of the way as it crashed through the deck rail and into the water. Adonia's heart pounded so fiercely she couldn't hear anything but its tempo. She realized a moment or two later that Jim was standing next to her, yelling at her.

"Orders!" he barked. 

_Think, Addie, think, damn_ _you!_

"We'll not abandon this ship!" she yelled back as the _Lass_ floundered, crippled without her mainmast. "Whether or not we do, they'll be upon us, so we will not. We stand our ground!"

Unable to do much else, she stormed down to the main deck, sharp blue eyes a fevered fury of hate and steel. Her gaze swept over her crew, huddled at their various battle stations but watching her, their eyes alight with fear, all fixed on her. Adonia drew a deep breath. She was their captain, and she had yet to let them down. She heaved herself onto the fallen mainmast as the _Lass_ drifted. Jaw set, she drew her cutlass and pointed it at the closing Company ship. 

"The bastards aboard that ship want to ensure the likes of ye are wiped from the seas! Now, I've been your captain for three years; have I ever _once_ let ye fall into such ravening clutches?"

"No, cap'n!" her crew called up to her, a little weaker than she'd hoped. Then again, fear was the most powerful paralytic. 

"Aye, and I'll not see that happen today! So I ask ye all—who is your captain?"

Her crew cried out a cacophony of "You are!" and "Adonia Barbossa!" and her favorite, "Naught but you!"

"And which ship do ye call your home?"

" _Dainty_ _Lass_!" they bellowed.

"And not a one of you would be here if I didn't think you had balls enough to stand and fight for her, or for me, or for your own lives! So when Beckett's bastards come aboard this lovely _Lass_ , I'd best see ye fight like the devil himself was at the end of your blade!"

Drawing arms, her crew roared assent, and Adonia turned with a fiendish grin toward the Company ship as it pulled alongside the _Lass_. No, she would not sit at home with a fight to be had, not today.


	5. The Captain Captured

The first boarders to come over from the EITC ship were met with the echoing crack of pistol fire and the _shing_ of angry steel. A half-dozen Company marines fell before they even had a chance to form up and fire on the pirates. In fact, they barely had a chance now, as Adonia's men rushed them, blades drawn, howling curses. Swords met bayonets with clangs like a broken church bell. Adonia lunged for the closest officer, a nondescript bewigged man wearing the blue and gold coat of the Company. She raised her cutlass to slash down across his collar bone, but he whirled, sword raised, to block her attack. The officer froze, immediately, his brown eyes wide with recognition, though for Adonia the memory of his face was faint, the way a dream became hazy upon waking.

"Captain Barbossa!" he gasped. His voice was warm and smooth with a proper gentleman's accent.

Adonia squinted at him. The cut of his jaw and the tone of his voice were... familiar... She knew she'd seen him before, but she'd never met a Company officer before, nor did she particularly enjoy the experience right now.

"Have we met?"

The officer opened his mouth to respond when a gunshot ripped through the air. Adonia yelped as it the shot tore into her shoulder, and she whirled away to fold in on herself, cutlass falling to the deck. The officer she'd almost killed rushed to her side, a hand on her back, and she shrugged him off, the heel of her palm pressed into the gaping wound. She heard Jim yell out " _Capitaine_!" before marines surrounded her, separating him from her. Adonia looked up to see a swarm of marines had flooded her deck, holding her men at gunpoint. _Damn it!_

"What a delightful buccaneer greeting," called a clipped voice from the other side of the deck.

Adonia turned, nostrils flaring with sharp breaths, to see Cutler Beckett striding onto her ship as if he owned it, hands tucked in the small of his back. His brown frock coat fluttered in the sea wind as he looked around, chin raised just enough to give him the appearance of leering at everything. Adonia forced herself to stand upright despite the fire ripping through her shoulder. She was a noticeable two or three inches taller than Beckett when he finally stood before her, his eyes narrowed with cold calculation and disdain.

"Is it yer custom, Mister Beckett, to fire upon any passin' ship which strikes your fancy?"

"It's _Lord_ Beckett, actually," he sniffed, "and no, I'm quite selective. Which is why your little boat, _Miss_ Barbossa, has sailed right into my harbor."

"It's Captain Barbossa, actually," Adonia growled in reply. Beckett gave her a tight-lipped smile.

"Of course. My error. How ever do you keep from being confused with your father, my, my." Beckett paced around her toward the deck rail to inspect the fallen mainmast. "He is why you're here, after all, is it not? A long-lost daughter seeking her elusive father, I believe?"

"I'm _here_ because there are still parts of the ocean for free pirates to sail."

"Is that so? Hm. Odd, because I have a friend in Tortuga who was _very_ adamant that you lapped up his information and were quite eager to be on your way here."

_Avery_. Adonia's eyes narrowed. That gutless, recreant bastard. She should have known. He was so quick to pass on vague information, and she latched onto it without her usual efforts to check authenticity. She had always been so _careful_ , verging on cunning, but the one time her emotions leaped leagues ahead of her brain, look at the cost. Her ship, crippled; her men, captured. Never mind her own wound, blood oozing from the gash despite her attempts to hold her arm immobile. She leaned toward Beckett, eyes afire. A pair of bayonetted rifles crossed between them, keeping her back.

"Tell your traitorous swine of a confidant," she hissed, "that the next time I am in Tortuga, I'll be sendin' him to the depths _myself_ , and I'll keep his tavern as recompense." 

Beckett sniffed. He took a step back as if to make it less apparent that he had to look up to meet her eyes.

"I would, except it is most unfortunate that you will be unable to exact your vengeance," he said. "You may not have noticed, captain, but I have taken your ship."

"What! _No._ I thought ye'd come over for tea."

Beckett's lips twitched as if contemplating a smirk. Adonia's face was unmoved, stone-cold and angry despite her sardonic utterances. This insolent twat thought he could take all he wanted on both land and sea? Adonia's nature was to fight and resist, but part of her was scared because she knew, deep down, that Beckett could do it. She looked past him at her crew. They were her responsibility, not her pride, not her sarcasm. She had to keep them safe.

"Fine then," she spat before Beckett could speak. "What d'ye want?"

"I have reliable information indicating that the Brethren Court plans to convene," Beckett said, "and your father, as I'm sure you know, is one of the pirate lords of the Court."

"Aye, but that hardly has a thing to do with me." _Papa_ _a pirate_ _lord_ _? Since when?_

"Does it not? Perhaps I was mistaken. I assumed in your eagerness to locate him you would accept _any_ opportunity to do so. And I'd hoped that he might return your sentiments and be equally eager to locate you. If that's not the case, then there's no reason to continue this conversation."

Beckett turned to go, and Adonia's gut dropped. No, no, she had to keep him talking, keep bargaining. Otherwise he'd broadside her little brig and it'd all be over. She wasn't going to do that to her crew. They trusted her. She looked at them and saw the panic lurking in their eyes, hidden by their stoic expressions.

"Lord Beckett!" She took a lunging step forward. The officer was immediately behind her, and the rifles crossed before her again, but she shouldered past them. She saw Beckett pause and continued toward him. "Ye've not explained your plan, milord. I can hardly come aboard if I can't find the ship you're sailing."

When Beckett turned to her with his calculating little smile, Adonia knew she was trapped. He had her cornered, like a kitten surrounded by hounds. She could hiss and arch her spine all day, but he had bigger claws and teeth right now. Perhaps he had never intended to open fire on her ship. He just wanted her to do exactly as she had done. _Damn him!_

"My plan, captain, is to rid these waters of piracy and make way for progress, as I am sure you have no doubt already observed. However, to effect this goal, I must know where the Brethren plan to meet. If you possess that information, I pray you, share it now and save me some precious time."

"...I do not," Adonia said.

It was entirely truthful. She had already been taken by surprise with Beckett's information that her father was a pirate lord. He must have been one already when she was with him, or else obtained the title after she was gone. If he had already been one, was that why he called her his sea princess? She knew nothing of the function or dealings of the Brethren Court; she had only ever heard the name, whispered as a relic from past ages. Did that make her pirate royalty? What a foolish, childish thought to entertain, especially now, here, with her and her crew's lives at stake! Yet there it was, lingering in the back of her mind, hungry for acknowledgment. With a title like that, she could be a person of quality, not just a common thief.

"That's unfortunate," Beckett quipped. "Ah, well. I'll continue with the rest of my arrangements, then, which do, in fact, include you. I cannot think of a father alive who would not go to great lengths to ensure his daughter's safety—or, in fact, any father at all, but that's neither here nor there...

"The point remains, captain, that your father, distant though he apparently is, will not be able to resist the lure to rescue you from my clutches the very moment he hears I have you. Then you shall receive the family reunion you so _desperately_ crave—enough to accept information at face value, I see—and I shall receive the location of the Brethren Court.

"Therefore," Beckett went on, raising his voice to be audible by all, "you and your crew are hereby pressed into the service of the East India Trading Company, and your ship shall sail as my personal escort, to be captained by you as I order you to captain it."

Chills raced down Adonia's spine. Her crew broke out in roars of defiance and revulsion as they heard him, but she said nothing. Press-ganged to be bait for her father—nay, for the entire Brethren Court. She wanted to laugh and spit in Beckett's face and bark that her father would never come for her, that he had abandoned her to the seas over a decade ago and he'd not come back for her now. But she knew if she did, she would be signing her crew's death warrants. She'd not do that to them. No decent captain, no captain worth following, did that to his crew. She would not be doing it to hers.

"Don't do it, _mon_ _capitaine_!" Jim yelled to her from where he was restrained. Adonia saw shackles clamped around his wrists and fumed. Jim had already come from chains; he would not go back to them under her watch.

"Fuck 'im and his orders!" Thom shouted too. "Rather we all die here than sail wit' his lot!"

"Do you agree with your crewmen, _capitaine_?" Beckett asked her, clipped and sneering. "Would you prefer death to my employ? That can be arranged, believe me."

Adonia looked at her crew again, helpless. Pain throbbed through her shoulder from the still-embedded bullet, but that was not why hot tears stung her eyes. At her side, she heard the officer with the brown eyes inhale slowly, as if discomfited by the situation. Part of her desperately wanted to break the tension of the moment and turn to him with glinting eyes and an easy smirk and ask "Your face seems all rather familiar; I'd not soon forget something so handsome," if only to relieve herself of this agony. Die here by sword and rifle and cannonade, or swear to sail, living physically but dying in spirit?

_No,_ she thought, _t_ _his bastard does not get the luxury of owning_ _my_ _spirit. I survive. It's what I do. And if he thinks I'll not fight to free myself, he doesn't know me half as well as he likes to pretend._

"What becomes of my crew, my ship, and me once you have the Brethren?" she asked, fighting to keep her voice steady in the face of her terrified men.

"Well," Beckett said with a slow smile, "that depends entirely on your performance—and your loyalty. I am not without mercy, captain; I reward those who serve well."

"...aye," Adonia said. "Ye'll not find a better crew in these waters. But if we're to serve then I demand a say in our treatment. If we're to be your bait for that father of mine, then I'll not have your men aboard my ship."

"You expect me to simply _trust_ you? When pirates are so notoriously fickle with their loyalties?"

"Yes, and you know I'll scuttle this ship before you can take her if you _don't_ trust me."

"You're hardly irreplaceable, you know."

"Am I? The daughter of a pirate lord, irreplaceable?" Adonia shifted her weight and squared her shoulders, lifting her chin. "So you'd prefer my father come down upon ye with fury and all hell to avenge my loss, rather than fall so neatly into your hands? Well, if there can be no agreeing between us, I suppose there's naught I can say."

"Your point is well taken," Beckett snipped. He drew in a long inhale, as if buying himself time to ponder. "Very well. My men will stay aboard your ship until it has been repaired and then take their leave. Is that your only condition?"

"Ye'll not replace a single man of my crew with one of your own, but neither will we be treated as second-class sailors. The _Dainty Lass_ is your bodyguard; we won't be treated as trophies or slaves. Furthermore, if you fire upon my father's ship before I as much as yell hello to him, I'll come aboard your ship and blow a hole in your skull. Do we have an accord?"

"You drive a _hard_ bargain." Sarcasm dripped down his words like water off a gutter. "But yes, agreed. None of that will happen."

Adonia stuck out her hand to shake on it, and when Beckett gripped her palm, he shook just hard enough to make fresh pain spike through her shoulder. She grimaced but tried, too slowly, to hide it. Beckett gave her a cool smile as he turned to take his leave.

"Lieutenant Groves," he said to the brown-eyed officer, "see that this ship is set to rights."

"Yes, sir," Groves said. _Groves, Groves—where do I know that name?_ He looked at Adonia with an almost sorrowful gaze before turning to order his cadre of marines and some Company sailors to action. "Step to, men! Haul up the rigging out of the water and prepare tow lines!"

Then he was gone, and Adonia inched away, shaking as she headed for the wheel despite being unable to do anything with it. When she reached the wheel, she slumped down against its housing, holding her shoulder and fighting tears. _Maybe it would've been better if I'd had us all killed._

Footsteps on the deck boards made her turn her head without looking up. She knew she sound of Jim's boots, and she figured Thom was right behind him.

"I'm sorry," she whispered to them. She turned away, trying not to let them see her tears. They needed a strong captain, not one who was so easily cowed and who sat crying from pain. "You'd rather us all die than submit but—the ship—the men—I can't—"

"Hush up, _capitaine_ ," Jim chided her. "You're lettin' that bullet do the talking for you, here, let's see it."

He crouched beside her and took her arm, peeling back her coat, vest, and blouse to get a look at it. He _tsked_ softly.

"Thom, fetch up the cap'n's kit," he said, and Thom was gone without a word.

The _Lass_ 's small crew often wore many hats. They were too few to have a dedicated barber and surgeon, so Jim often did his best. Under a previous captain, Adonia, too, had received rudimentary training in medicine, enough to remove bullets and patch up cuts. She and Jim shared the toolkit Thom had just gone to retrieve. She bit her lip as Jim prodded at the bloody hole in her shoulder.

"Doesn't seem too deep," he said. "Don't think anything's broken."

"No," Adonia said, her voice barely above a whisper. She took a deep breath and tried to force her way through the haze of confusion and throbbing pain. _What have I done to_ _my_ _crew? Have I just delayed their deaths to another day?_ "It was just enough to stop me, not to really harm me. Really fucking hurts, all the same."

"Well, you did always have a low pain tolerance, _n'est-ce_ _pas_?" Jim chuckled softly, a deep rumble in his chest, and Adonia smirked.

"Yes, yes, I'm weak," she said just as Jim returned with both the toolkit and a bottle of rum. He pressed the rum into her hands—she glared at it with disdain but popped the cork stopper and took a long swig to dull the ache in her shoulder—and the kit into Jim's. Then he crouched nearby to keep an eye out.

"That all's not what I'd've done, cap'n," he noted. He sighed and ran a hand through his thick, dark hair. "I'd've scuttled us."

"I know it, Thom. But I was not about to watch the lot of you die and have it be my fault. Even if I died with you, I couldn't live out me final moments like that." Adonia took another gulp of rum and grimaced as it burned down her throat. "Why don't we have wine on this ship... "

"Next port," Jim noted as he selected the tools for his work. "Hold still."

Just as he got to work—prodding inside the wound with a metal tool to fully locate the bullet—and Adonia closed her eyes so she didn't have to watch, Lieutenant Groves came up from the main deck.

"Captain Barbossa, the ship is—ah, ma'am, I'd be happy to take you across to the _Endeavour_ for the ship's surgeon to help..."

"Jim's got it covered, lieutenant, thank you." She cracked one eye open, then both, to look at him. "We've met, aye?"

"Yes, we—we have." _Good God, is he blushing? Whatever for?_ "Port Royal, about three years ago."

The memory surged in her mind as his face and voice fully clicked into place, and she laughed hard enough that Jim growled at her to sit still and shut up. She took a third swig of rum (better stop, though, or else she'd be good for naught). 

"And how," she chuckled, "are your shirts, lieutenant?"

Thom looked at her like she'd lost her mind. Jim rolled his eyes and sighed. Groves noticeably blushed and fidgeted with the large gold cuff of his coat.

"Just fine, thank you," he muttered. He cleared his throat and ducked his head. "Excuse me, I'll... leave you to your cure."

With that, he was gone, and Adonia leaned her head back, warmed through by the rum (despite the pain from Jim's surgery) and amused despite the day's terrors.

"...shirts?" Thom asked, a brow arched. Adonia grinned at him with the tense, tight smile of pain tempered by humor.

"I'll tell ye when you're older, laddie," she mocked with a bad impression of his brogue.

"Fuck you, cap'n," he snorted, though he gave her a smirk and a wink as he got up to get back to work.

"Aye, and same to you, bosun. Keep my ship afloat or I'll hang ye from the yardarm!" 

"Promises, promises!" Thom yelled back to her.

Adonia settled in quietly at that, eyes closing again while Jim chided her for moving. Of course she resorted to humor just now. What else was she to do? She felt the ship move under them as the tow cables were tied off and the _Endeavour_ began to haul them away. This was only what she deserved for being such a fool, for entertaining such childish hopes of reuniting with her father. That was not like to happen. He'd not come for her because Beckett had her as a glorified hostage. He hadn't come for her in eleven years. Why would he start now?

At least this situation would afford her the chance to know more fully what was happening in the world. She hadn't known the Brethren Court planned to meet. Hell, she hadn't known Papa was a pirate lord. She hadn't known Groves had left the Royal Navy, or perhaps been press-ganged out of it. And she _certainly_ hadn't known Beckett knew as much of her as he did. Things were not looking up for the _Dainty Lass_ and her crew. But at least this way, she could gather information. She could buy and barter time. And then, someday hopefully soon, she'd be able to strike.


	6. A Memory: The Captain at Work

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "So, how did Adonia get banned from Port Royal?" Glad you asked.

_Three years ago._

Long ago, as a wee young lass, Adonia had learned that the cleverest pirates became the ones who grew the richest and lived the longest. She liked to think cleverness came naturally to her, honed by a life at sea, and she also liked to think that a life of wealth and prestige could be hers for the taking. Well, maybe not the prestige. Maybe just the wealth. Even if she never earned the title, she still clung to Papa's name for her, his sea princess, though that was all she had left to cling to by this point.

It had been almost effortless to start her mercantile empire. A simple plan, truly—prey upon slow, well-loaded merchant ships, relieve them of their cargo, and leave the crew alive but the ship damaged enough to limp. By the time the vessel would make port, she would be gone, cargo in hand to sell, and all the merchant crew could say was "It was pirates!" 

"But we're not _pirates_ ," she liked to tell her crew with a toss of her hair. "We are _businessmen."_

Businessmen, after all, did not kill or pillage. Damaging a ship enough to slow it down was not the same as broadsiding a coastal village. Besides, if this was a business venture, Adonia felt a certain level of prestige came with it. In this disguise, she could be a proper lady of quality, with all the frippery pertaining thereto. 

It was why her crew chose as their prey ships carrying only the finest goods. She did not deal in agriculture or livestock or slaves. (The mere thought of the latter put a shiver in her bones she'd not soon entertain.) But sugar, silk, fine furniture, gold, silver, gems—these were the building blocks of her little empire, the one that sailed under a simple flag identifying her as a subject of the king rather than as the kingless pirate she knew, deep down, that she was. The _Dainty Lass_ was a merchant brig unaffiliated with any of the major trading companies, though when pressed to answer how that was possible, she insisted she was the mistress of her very own company, Bonny Lassie Trade and Mercantile. A woman in such a business was already enough to raise brows, but Adonia was happy to dance along the edge of polite society and feed them luxuries and vices. 

So it was that she had found her way to the various colonies of the Caribbean, one by one, selling the goods she had amassed. Her prices were just cheaper than market value, but as she had paid not a pound for them, her profit was exquisite. She outfitted herself, her ship, and her crew in naught but the best, all while stashing away her share of the profits in the care of an account manager in Bermuda. Her crew wanted for nothing. Gold and happiness were plentiful among them, and the _Dainty Lass_ found herself a reputation for quality.

Before long Adonia found consistent demand in Port Royal, where she set up a little market stall at the docks and wooed her customers with fine wares, cheap prices, and her own natural, beaming charm. On one visit, even the governor—a friendly older chap that Adonia liked very much—heard of her and came to browse her selection, taking home an elegant velvet chaise. Jim hadn't wanted to even take the chaise from its previous owners, complaining about its size, but Adonia just smirked at him as Governor Swann counted out the gold pieces into her palm.

This visit was no different. The _Dainty Lass_ sailed into Port Royal, flying her (false) colors proudly, and Adonia and Jim set up the little market stall the same as always. A smattering of usual customers came and went, buying cloth and sugar and spices. A tavern owner, griping that his shipment of rum had never come in, bought their entire stock of the stuff and was still grumbling when he left. Adonia was just measuring out a pound of tea for a housewife when a flash of blue cloth caught her eye, and she glanced up to find a young Royal Navy officer browsing the stall. Old fears surged up, and for a split second she thought he'd come to call her on her fraud and hang her. But no—no—he was just calmly browsing. Adonia let out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding, traded tea for silver, and slid over toward the young officer.

"A fine mornin' to ye, good sir," she said brightly, giving her blue coat and the lace cuffs of her shirt a neatening tug as she smiled. Her auburn hair was long and loose around her shoulders for once, the sea breeze sighing through the strands. "Is there anything in particular you'd hope to see?"

The officer looked up as if not quite expecting to be spoken to. Ever so briefly, their eyes met, blue and brown, and Adonia saw the officer's jaw slacken a little before he cleared his throat and dropped his gaze.

"I—um—yes," he said. He rolled his shoulders and reclaimed his straight-backed posture. His voice was warm and so very proper. It reminded Adonia of a deep, still sea, glassy with sunlight but dark with unknown depths. She quite liked the cut of his jaw and the furrow of his brow. He glanced at her. "It's an odd request, but I wondered if you might have any gentlemen's shirts."

"Gentlemen's shirts?" Adonia repeated. She opened her inventory ledger and started to flip through.

"Yes, as if for a uniform."

"Like the fine one ye've got on?"

To her surprise, the young officer blushed darkly enough she knew he knew she'd noticed.

"Yes, precisely," he stammered. _Why do I make him so nervous? It's sugar and rum I'm selling, not_ _meself_ _._ "I had ordered some from England but unfortunately they never made it here."

"That _is_ unfortunate," Adonia said. She looked up from her ledger with a bright smile. "Well, Mister...?"

"Groves, ma'am."

"Mister Groves, I do have here in my lists 'gentlemen's shirts, white, three.' So I'd say fortune favors you today. Best not fail to take advantage of that."

"Oh, you—you do?" His brows rose with surprise. "That's... ahem, yes, I would like to see them, please."

Adonia turned for the chest that held her limited collection of clothing and threw it open with a small flourish. Inside, right on top, were the shirts—a recent haul from an inbound merchant vessel. These were such fine quality that she had snatched them right up, and now she was about to re-sell them for more than the cloth was worth! And Jim told her that trying to hawk clothing would never work...

"Right then, here you are," she said warmly, bringing the articles back to her waiting customer. Her eyes glinted in the sun as if with mischief. "In fact just by looking at them I'd say they'll fit you aright." 

"I hope so," Groves replied. He was blushing again, and Adonia's smile faltered slightly as she cocked her head at a small angle. Was he all right?

Just about then, though, another officer, with squared shoulders and furrowed brows, approached Adonia's little market stall. This one held noticeable rank as a second junior officer followed him. She slid a bit to the side, letting Groves inspect his purchase. Best not to hover. Legitimate businesswomen did not hover.

"A useful stock, Groves?" inquired the new officer, casting a sharp green gaze over the wares. Groves turned and quickly saluted.

"Captain Norrington, yes, sir, everything seems to be in order," he replied. He held one of the shirts against his chest to try to gauge the fit.

Adonia slid back over, giving her coat another neatening tug as the stern captain lifted a gold watch chain between his fingers. He looked up and met her gaze, and Adonia had the terrible sense that he could see right through her and knew the wretch that she was. She knew his reputation, of course. His fervor for cleaning up the Caribbean had directly contributed to Port Royal's comparative excellence as a town. The only problem with it was Adonia, of course, danced right along the edge of _legitimate_ and frequently—secretly, she hoped—side-stepped into _illegal_. 

"You must be Captain... Bonny, is it?" Captain Norrington asked calmly, evenly. There was a patience in his voice that made it impossible to read whether or not he knew Adonia's name was false.

"Yes, indeed, good morning," she replied with a smile. "Anything ye've in mind today, captain?"

He set down the watch chain and turned aside, moving down the row of wares.

"Browsing," he said, an easy aloofness in his tone and posture as his other junior officer trotted alongside.

"Well, do let me know if there's something you'd like; I have more I haven't set out." Adonia eased back toward Groves as he finished checking the shirts. "Do you find them to your liking, sir?"

"I do, very much," he replied. "It's quite extraordinary—they seem to be precisely my measurements."

He carefully folded the shirts back, one at a time. Adonia's gut tensed suddenly with _danger_. His measurements _exactly_? And he'd ordered a set of three from England, he said? Surely a coincidence. Men ordered shirts all the time. Neither he nor she had any proof these were the ones.

"You've incredible fortune then!" Adonia said. Groves gave her a tiny smile.

"Yes, I suppose so. How did you come by these?"

"Ah, I've a contact in Barbados who asked did I want any fine gentlemen's shirts, and I did, since I knew I was coming straight to a fort full of fine gentlemen." She gave him a wink and almost laughed as his ears pinkened under his wig.

"Well, then, your man must have excellent estimates," Groves said.

He folded the last shirt, and as he did, a cloth tag stitched into the hem fell out into plain view. Adonia saw his eyebrows rise sharply, and he ducked for a closer look at the tag. Even from where she stood, she could see _T. Groves_ embroidered on the tag. _No, no, no, s_ _hit!_

"Captain!" Groves yelped with surprise. "The shirts I ordered from England, they're here!"

_Oh, fuck._

"That's impossible," Norrington replied with an almost weary dismissal. Then Groves carted the shirts to him to show the tag, and the very second he saw the embroidery, his gaze flashed angrily to Adonia, one hand reaching for the hilt of his rapier.

"Gentlemen, I assure you, there must be some mistake," Adonia said as smoothly and calmly as she possibly could. Behind her, Jim squared up and began easing for the _Lass_. "I am a woman of utmost _quality_ , sir!"

" _Quality_ here having the meaning of _thief_ ," Norrington spat. "Is it your practice to steal goods that have already been sold, _captain_?"

He stepped up closer to her, eyes narrowed. He stood at least five inches above her, and suddenly she felt so small. Now she knew he really could see through her, and he saw exactly the absence of moral fortitude she was afraid he'd see.

"Groves, Gillette, I want this woman and her crew arrested immediately and their cargo confiscated while we compare her inventory to those of the raided merchant ships."

Groves seemed to hesitate, but he began scooping up the wares he could carry as the other officer, Gillette, rushed away, undoubtedly to collect soldiers. Adonia looked over at Groves, her eyes pained as he packed up her goods. He looked back at her, and those brown eyes seemed sad. _Dammit, if I'd checked those shirts, this wouldn't have happened—_

"I know exactly who you are, Adonia Barbossa," Norrington hissed to her. "You use a false name here but nowhere else, and your ship is completely unregistered. Did you _really_ think the Royal Navy wouldn't find out about your 'Bonny Lassie Mercantile' fraud?"

Adonia straightened up, squashing the fear clawing in her chest. She glanced around him to see whether the marines were on their way. She smirked up at the captain, hands on her hips.

"Nay, but it took ye a damned long time," she snapped. "Not quite so bright as you lot like to pretend, a pirate openly at work in your midst! Ban me from your little island if you like, but I'll not go to the gallows!"

Just then, Gillette and the soldiers rounded the corner. From the deck of the _Lass_ , Jim whistled sharply, and immediately the crew stepped to. Adonia leaped back from Norrington just as he drew his sword, grinning almost ferally as she snatched up a few expensive trinkets and her moneybag, shoving them all into every available pocket. She drew her cutlass for good measure as she sprinted away, up the gangway and onto her ship. The captain and Groves both gave chase, but she and Jim yanked the gangway onto the deck just as they stepped on, sending them sprawling onto their backs on the dock. The soldiers immediately dropped into firing formation, tamping powder and shot firmly in place with their ramrods. 

"It's been a true pleasure, gentlemen!" Adonia yelled down to them as the anchor cleared the waterline and wind filled the mainsails. "My regards to the governor; do let me know how he likes his chaise. And lieutenant, I hope you enjoy your shirts!"

The soldiers opened fire on the _Lass_ , and Adonia and Jim dropped flat against the deck to shield themselves from whistling bullets. Bits of the hull splintered off, but not enough to do any real damage. After the volley, Adonia picked herself up and ran for the helm, grabbing the wheel.

"Quickly, love, quickly," she breathed to her ship.

For the _Lass_ , it was full speed ahead to get out of the bay as fast as her sails could take her; without her cargo haul, she was quick and light and able to veer away from the dock before Norrington and his men could board by force. She couldn't help looking back, though, especially at Groves. He'd blushed to talk to her. Maybe if she _had_ been a proper lady, he'd have—

No. Stupid, wishful thinking. Pirates and Navy officers did not mix. They couldn't. One or both would die. But she tried to commit his face to memory, along with the way he was so sweetly flustered. At least the thought might amuse her, if she ever called it to mind again.

She especially needed amusement now, at any rate. Her entire business venture, gone. She still had all the money she'd made over the months—safely in the hands of her contact in Barbados, a clever woman of numbers named Margaret—but everything else was gone. Maybe it could have been worse. She could have been killed on sight or immediately clapped in irons. Losing all her cargo and her good ports was a blow, but, God, it was better than losing the _Lass_ and the crew. If she had to watch Thom swing, or see Jim be cowed and sent away to a sugar plantation again, she'd—well, she didn't know _what_ she'd do.

"I'd grown accustomed to a port without vomit in the streets," she sighed once they were away and Jim was at her side.

"Less of it, anyway," he noted. "But don't you worry, _mon_ _capitaine_. There's _quality_ ports left in these islands."

"You mock me, sir." She was teasing, at least a bit. Jim gave her a pointed look, and she sighed. They'd been together too long for him not to recognize her _eccentricities_ , as Captain Barnes had termed them, on sight—one of which was her desire to be... well... good.

"Adonia," Jim murmured. "No matter how you dice it, you and us, we're not like them in their fine blue coats and all."

"I don't know _what_ you're talking about, Jim. My coat is also blue."

"Jesus God," he groaned. "Your tongue is gonna get you killed one day. You know exactly what I mean."

Adonia gazed out across the rippling sea. She let out a slow breath. Of course she did. She, her crew, everyone she knew—common thieves and beggars all. They had no place in polite society. Maybe she tried her best to be a good, moral person, but at the end of the day, she was still a pirate. Her lace cuffs weren't more than a costume, a nobody pretending to be somebody. At least she had the sea. The sea didn't care. All it wanted was to know she loved it, and God, she did, enough to be its princess.

A low rumble of laughter from Jim interrupted her thoughts.

"...what?"

"The look on that Groves' face," he laughed, "when he saw the tags."

"Which we should have looked for! Bugger it."

"Aye, and now we're banned from the nicest port in the islands! I told you we shouldn't have taken clothing!"

"You told me, you told me! What, you want me to admit you were right?!"

Jim smirked at her, arms folded over his dark chest. Adonia glared at him.

"Fine. Jim, me lad, you were right. Goddamn."

"Pleasure to sail with you too, _capitaine_ ," he said, and he turned to get back to work.

Adonia leaned her chin on the wheel and sighed. Back to square one. But she'd make it. She always did. She was a survivor, and she'd lasted this long. As long as she never had to see any of those officers ever again, she'd be happy.


	7. The Captain in Limbo

_Present._

"I've seen worse, _capitaine_ , don't worry so much," Jim said with an unconvincing calmness. 

Adonia looked over her shoulder and shot him a glare from where she stood by the tiny window in her equally tiny quarters, cradling her healing arm in its sling. Beckett's ship, the _Endeavour_ , had towed the _Dainty Lass_ from Cuba back to Port Royal, and now Adonia and her crew were being housed ashore while the _Lass_ was repaired—all an elaborate ruse to give her the illusion of freedom while ensuring she didn't run for it. Might as well have thrown them all in prison. At least this way, even if there were guards outside the door, Jim or anyone else from the _Lass_ could come see their captain.

"Aye, you have," she grumbled, "but for us, here, now, in this situation, it is bad. I'll not apologize for worryin'."

She could see the bay from her window, but not the _Lass_. She had no idea if Beckett had ordered her scrapped just for good measure, or perhaps repainted in Company colors. All she could see were the distant, teal waves of the sea, taunting her. That was all she had seen as they returned. She hadn't seen Port Royal in three years, but now it seemed grim, as if the life of a bustling colony town had been squeezed out of it like water from a rag. Even with the sun above, it all seemed gray. Instead of a garrison of Royal Navy forces, now it was the hub of the Company's operations here. She loved money as much as the next pirate, but, God, it seemed such a burdensome force when it dictated people's lives like this. 

"We are alive," Jim pressed. "We may not like how that bargain was struck, but I tell you even Thom is grateful to live."

"Aye, for now. And what happens when we're forced to fire upon our own kind?"

_What happens if my father sees me flying their colors?_

Jim didn't have an answer for her, but Adonia knew he was mulling it over, so she didn't press him. He drummed his fingers on his thigh as he sat across the room from her, and she leaned against the window, trying to get a better angle to see if she could see the _Lass_. Still no.

"Dammit," she sighed.

This waiting game was like to drive her mad. Maybe that was what Beckett was counting on! She already knew she was a hostage, but one plied with a bed and hot meals. Maybe Beckett hoped to steal her crew from her with offers of higher wages, softer beds, prettier whores. But she knew her men. They'd not leave her for a shilling. For the finest rum and the absolute prettiest whore in Tortuga, maybe, but not for a shilling. 

There was a soft knock on the door. Adonia turned, brow arching in surprise when the door didn't immediately open. Jim gave her a furrowed-brow look of uncertainty and got up to answer the door on her behalf. He cracked open the door with a gruff, wary " _Qui_ _est-ce_?"

"It's Jim, isn't it?" Adonia recognized Lieutenant Groves' voice. "May I see your captain, Jim? Is she within?"

"Let him in," Adonia told Jim. "I don't think this one's come to assassinate me."

"Is that a common concern?" Groves asked as Jim stepped aside and allowed him through.

"I'm not really sure," she replied. "I've never been a hostage before."

Jim snorted a laugh and returned to his chair, fetching his journal and pencil, the two personal items he had, and opening to a blank page. The soft _skritch_ sounds of his work seemed to echo like a clock ticking as Groves awkwardly cleared his throat. 

"I'm sorry this is going so badly for you, Captain Barbossa," he said. 

"At least for right now there's not a gallows with my name on it."

"A gallows...?"

Without a word, Adonia opened the window and gestured Groves to lean close. Over the squawking gulls and the rush of the sea, they could hear the unmistakable dull thud of a gallows trapdoor opening, followed by the inevitable gurgling and choking as the rope tightened. The gruesome noises echoed from the nearby fort courtyard, and Groves paled.

"I—I didn't realize..."

"That _Lord_ Beckett put me in this chamber on purpose?"

"...that he was continuing the hangings. I thought... once he began coaxing the Brethren out of hiding..."

"Allow me a moment of unrepentant cynicism, lieutenant. Folk like Beckett, they get drunk on cruelty rather than rum. I'd not be a bit surprised if he's kept it up just for his amusement."

"...I suppose I knew that," Groves sighed as he shifted back from the window. "It's just that all of this—Beckett's takeover, the hangings, the whole lot—happened so quickly. Speaking for myself, I've barely had time to contemplate the man in whose service I now find myself."

"Find yourself?" Adonia asked, pulling the window closed. Groves nodded.

"Yes. When Lord Beckett arrived in Port Royal, he came with either the king's authority or his ignorance—"

"Aye, well, depending on the day, they're much the same thing."

"Indeed." Groves let out a derisive snort that, just for a moment, showed Adonia how frustrated he was in that blue and gold coat. "But he arrived in Port Royal, and some of us found ourselves suddenly working out our commissions in much different ways than we had expected. I knew we were in for a difficult run when he arrested both the governor and his daughter, but..."

His gaze skipped to the window. An unconscious shudder rippled through his frame. Adonia's brows furrowed. _He doesn't want to be here, either._

"...we rounded up women and children, too," Groves murmured. His gaze was distant, and now his body had half-turned away from Adonia. She tensed with unease. Why confess to her? "Literally any soul who could even remotely be accused of associating with pirates. We didn't even interrogate them. We just—"

He stopped himself as if seeming to remember where he was. Jim's sketching had stopped. The only sound in the room was the soft, incessant ticking of a timepiece by the bed. Adonia looked down and picked at a loose thread on her coat cuff. Groves cleared his throat uncomfortably.

"Forgive me," he said. "I did not mean to—that is, I came only to ensure your welfare."

"Well, we're faring," Adonia replied. 

"Then I should leave you be. Certainly, if I hear news of your ship's progress, I'll return with it."

Groves dipped his head in farewell as he turned to go. Adonia glanced out the window at the distant sea and sighed.

"How long were ye looking for me, lieutenant?"

She heard Groves swallow uncomfortably.

"Lord Beckett has sought out every possible pirate or pirate-associated person since his arrival some months ago," he replied. "It's almost a miracle you evaded him this long."

"Not a miracle—cleverness. But, again, how long were ye looking for _me_ , specifically?"

"...ah. After your, er, mercantile scam, there was an open warrant for your arrest, though I'm sure you were aware of that."

"To be expected, aye."

"And Lord Beckett did, of course, have plans to capture you. But then just recently he found a new ally in the pirate lord of Singapore, Sao Feng, who gave up the identity of your father as another pirate lord. So, he's kept you in his sights for this specific reason for less than a month. Not long at all.

"I am sorry, though," he continued, his gaze dropping. "It was unfair to use your father against you. To trap you with the hope of meeting him again... I can only imagine how you felt."

"Can ye?" Adonia asked, turning fully toward him. Across the room, Jim muttered "Eh, _merde_." Adonia's hands dropped to her side in clenched fists. "To be manipulated, _played_ , into the hands of a bastard like Beckett, when all I wanted was to demand answers of why the man what called himself my father _abandoned me_?" 

"Abandoned you?" Groves asked. "I thought—"

"That we'd have a happy reunion? Nay. My father, such as he is, dumped me on an empty dock when I was a bitty six years old with nary a reason nor explanation, save that I no longer had a place on his ship. So for eleven years I've been on me own, strugglin' to survive—because that's what I _do_ , lieutenant, I _survive_ —while he's been off gallivanting and God knows what else, freed of the burden of a child he claimed to love. And I'd intended to ask him _why_."

Silence hung in the air between them. Flushed with fury, Adonia realized how much tension she held in her frame, and she tried to relax her fists, to no avail. She folded her arms tightly and sighed, trying to follow the sigh with a deep breath. The look of surprise and—dare she say—sympathy on Groves' face made her squirm uncomfortably. _I don't want your pity. I want my revenge._

"I'm so sorry, captain," he murmured. "I had no idea. I would not wish such a childhood upon anyone, though I can't help but wonder if—"

"If what?" Her eyes narrowed uneasily. Groves tilted his head slightly, as if gauging her response.

"I... assumed you'd heard of what befell your father."

Adonia said nothing, cocking her head and furrowing her brows. What the hell was he on about? She'd heard nothing of her father in eleven years—nothing of any detail, anyway. There were the usual stories of the _Black Pearl_ seen pillaging and plundering, and aye, she'd noticed a fair number of uneasy glances and whispers at the sound of her last name, but...

"Ye'd best speak quick, lieutenant," she said, "and tell me what ye mean."

"About three years ago, my former commander pursued a ship of cursed pirates across the seas—vengeful and cruel, unable to die. The ship was the _Black Pearl_ , and I remember distinctly that your father was her captain, though I did not have the _privilege_ of making his acquaintance. I was not privy to all the details, but Commodore Norrington was able to defeat the pirates only when their curse was broken and your father killed."

The world seemed to abruptly clench around Adonia, squeezing her head at the temples and knocking the breath from her chest. She sagged into the windowsill, her nails digging into the wood. _The rumor was true_ _?_ Anger burned in her chest, and vengeful tears stung her eyes as she looked up at Groves. It wasn't until she felt Jim's hands on her shoulders that she realized she was visibly shaking and hadn't breathed. She gasped raggedly. 

"Dead?" _It's all a lie, I'm being lured to my death for a lie, Papa's not a pirate lord, he's not even alive, he's been dead three years and I never even knew..._

"Yes, he was. Was!" Groves quickly crossed back to her and crouched beside her, a hand on the windowsill as he looked up at her with soft, apologetic eyes. "I'm so sorry, captain, I didn't finish—Feng testified that your father had come to see him in Singapore, and that is how Feng knew of the Brethren's gathering. I have no idea how he could be dead and then return, but—"

"What is the testimony of a pirate worth to you?" Adonia choked. "Maybe Sao Feng lied! Maybe you've all lied to me and I should kill ye where ye stand."

"...I would appreciate it if you did not, but I would understand if you did," Groves murmured. Adonia stopped cold at that. No, no, she'd not kill a man who had nothing to do with it. A man like this, who looked at her with such gentleness and blushed when they spoke, was a man trapped by orders when his nature was far better than this. She sucked in another shaky breath.

"I'll save my shot for Beckett," she sighed, "if I ever get the chance. So is my father alive or not?"

"A pirate would lie about many things, I'm sure," Groves replied, "but Sao Feng was too eager to save himself. Besides, Beckett's man Mercer corroborated Feng's story and saw your father as well. I'm so sorry, captain. I should have opened with that."

"Aye, that's true." She realized suddenly that her grip had shifted from the windowsill to his shoulder. She swallowed hard and pulled her hand away. "So I am well and truly bait."

"...yes. I'm sorry."

"If ye keep bein' sorry about this, then ye'll not have sorry left for the big mistakes," Adonia snorted. She took one last deep breath to steady herself. _Think, Addie, use your_ _brain_. _You're clever and quick. Best begin to act it._ "I understand a man followin' orders. It's not ye I despise.

"Besides," she continued, mustering a smile, "how could I be cruel to me very best customer?"

Groves flushed the color of Adonia's hair and got to his feet, stammering. _It's just shirts_ , she wanted to say to him, but instead she smirked silently and let him fret. It was amusing, in its way, though she couldn't figure why she'd send him into a tizzy like that. Jim chuckled, low in his throat, beside her.

"Well, I—I believe I've overstayed my welcome, as I'd only come to ensure your welfare—" Groves muttered, turning quickly for the door.

"Don't be a stranger!" Adonia called. "I may have more shirts for ye next time!"

The last thing Groves heard as he closed the door was her bright, trilling laugh. Adonia waited for his footsteps to fade down the hall before she looked up at Jim.

"What do ye make of all that, then?"

"Don't think you should've told him about your childhood," Jim mused. "Might come back to find it used against you. But then, maybe not by that boy. Seems to admire you."

"He'd better not," Adonia said. "Admiring a pirate will get him killed."

_I hope he doesn't come back. He's too decent to lose his life for_ _talkin_ _' to the likes of me._

"Might be worth checkin' into, this thing about a curse," Jim added. "Might explain a few things."

"Aye, it might at that." _I asked you if the treasure was sick, Papa. Why did you lie?_ "So we continue as planned. We sail so politely and do as told, and when we find my father..."

She trailed off, but Jim nodded in understanding and agreement. Adonia picked herself up and neatened her coat, looking out the window. _One day I'll have the truth._


End file.
